The way to enter a crucial series against division leading Baltimore is not with a three-game losing streak.

But that’s the hand the Blue Jays dealt themselves after losing 6-1 on Sunday afternoon to mark their third consecutive loss against the lowly Houston Astros. Coupled with Baltimore’s 1-0 victory over Seattle, the Jays are now 31/2 games back of the O’s.

The inability to take advantage of early scoring opportunities doomed the Jays in their first two losses here and Sunday proved to be no different.

They couldn’t add on in the second with one out and runners on the corners and couldn’t come through with the clutch hit in the third with the bases loaded either.

Overall, the Jays managed eight hits — all of them singles.

The results of the past three games when the combined to score a grand total of four runs made them appear flat and weary.

When someone posed the F-word (flat) to Gibbons post-game he snapped back.

“I don’t know if we were flat, either,” he said. “But no, everybody is tired this time of the year. I don’t agree with you saying that we were flat, if you were paying attention, watching a pretty good team out there. They outpitched us. We didn’t pitch particularly well this series other than maybe Happ (in the 3-1 loss Friday). We had some opportunities to cash in, we didn’t get that done.

“It was a good road trip, it could have been a great one but we have a welcome day off tomorrow and then we play the team we’re chasing. But flat, that’s probably ignorant.”

Offensively, though, they weren’t up to snuff.

“Yeah, that’s the way the game goes sometimes,” Gibbons added. “They got the big hits with guys on base, we didn’t. The first couple series this trip, we were getting those and the other teams didn’t.”

Taking the loss was Marcus Stroman to snap a personal three-game win streak. With the defeat he drops to 7-3.

In his three previous starts he had gone seven innings all three times, allowed no runs in two of them and one run in the other.

Maybe he was due for a pounding.

The three innings, plus four batters marked the shortest stat of Stroman’s rookie season while the five runs tied his career high.

The Jays end a promising road trip with a 6-4 record after entering Houston at 5-1. They have an off day Monday followed by three games against Baltimore and then another three at home against the beefed up Detroit Tigers.

Stroman said that despite the three losses, the team remains confident.

“Coming here, just because we weren’t able to win this series against the Astros, it doesn’t mean that our confidence waivered in any way,” Stroman said. “The boys are confident, we know what we can do. We’ll get home, have the off-day and I’m sure we’ll come out fired up and ready to go on Tuesday.

While the Jays couldn’t come up with the big hit it was no problem for the Astros.

In the third they had the bags full and two out with Chris Carter at the plate. Stroman quickly jumped in front 0-2 but lost that edge as he came with three straight balls. Carter then drilled a two-run single to left as Stroman hung a breaking ball.

It was just a sign of things to come as the Astros opened the fourth with a single, double, RBI single, RBI single and that was it for Stroman.

Still, Gibbons is far from being discouraged.

“We’ve been playing good baseball,” Gibbons said. “The last three games didn’t go out way, pure and simple. But we have a nice off-day tomorrow and we play the teams that matter — Baltimore, then Detroit and Seattle, three really good teams. We’ll have a little bit better idea where we’re at after that.”

The Jays took the lead for the fourth consecutive time this series with a run in the second.

Juan Francisco and Colby Rasmus got it started hen both beat the shift by hitting broken bat singles to the same spot in shallow right-centre.

Munenori Kawasaki followed with a slow grounder to second and Jose Altuve decided to take the sure out at first rather than try for Rasmus as second.

Ryan Goins then delivered a line drive just over the glove of a leaping Gonzalez. It initially froze Rasmus and when it fell safely, Francisco scored and Rasmus went to third. But that was it as Anthony Gose ended the inning by grounding into a double play.

The next inning the Jays let a golden opportunity to add to their lead slip by as they had the bases loaded with two out thanks to a Jose Reyes single and two walks. But Juan Francisco hit a room service grounder to second for an easy double play and that was that.

In more ways than one.

STROMAN TO PUT LOSS BEHIND HIM

HOUSTON — Sunday was one of those days when everything Marcus Stroman threw to the plate was slop.

He had trouble locating his fastball and his breaking stuff seldom had any bite.

There are times when a pitcher can get by with his ‘B’ game but when you have nothing to fall back on, that’s when it gets tough.

“I just didn’t have my stuff,” the Jays starter said following the shortest outing of his career. “I knew it in the first, I kind of didn’t have it. It was a bad day, just looking forward to the off-day, getting back home and kind of regrouping and getting back to our winning ways.”

Stroman retired the first seven batters he faced, gave up two runs in the third then couldn’t retire a batter in the fourth. After four consecutive hits he was done.

Was there any positives he could take from the outing?

“No, not at all,” he said. “I just put it in the past, forget about it and focus on my next start against the Tigers.”